By 
The term “core” has become a bit of a buzzword in recent years in the fitness world. It is one of those words that everyone thinks they know about but only a few really know about it. The core is much more than just 6 pack abs as most people would assume, it goes a lot deeper than that, figuratively and literally…
Steve Nash is an athlete who is known for his core stability. You can tell in the way he plays—-his core stability provides him with balance even when he takes a jump-shot.
What Is The Core?
The core itself consists of the muscles in the abdominal, torso and lower back including all the many small stabilizer muscles between the vertebrae of the spine (think of a mannequin without arms). The core is the body’s “powerhouse”. It is referred to like this because this is where the power is generated from in all the bodily movements. It is where the body’s center of gravity is and having great core strength and stability can improve balance and body control. The core is the vital link between the upper and lower body and plays a very important role if we are looking to improve the betterment of our movement and athletic abilities. Having a stable core means more of power output in your limbs and muscles as the powerhouse is secure as well as a decreased chance of injury.
How Should The Core Be Trained?
Before we even go into how the core is to be trained, let’s look at how the body works in or for movement. During a movement, like a jump or even just walking, there are several muscles working at once to facilitate the outcome or movement. Rarely, is a muscle worked or working on its own to provide movement, there is always an antagonist, synergist and fixator helping the main muscle. With this in mind, it would be safe to assume that isolation exercises or training in this fashion is limited and core training is no different. Knowing this, we really have to question the theory behind using the countless amount of sit-ups if we want to build a strong and stable core.
Side Plank Hold
If anything we are building, hip flexor strength and ab endurance. Stability, Strength then Power. The way to approach core training is to look at it as if we were building a house almost. There have to be layered and it has to be strong but the first link or layer should always be stabilization. The “house” can withstand anything if its foundation is stable. Stabilization is all-important to help the movements of our body to be more effective. Being stable means everyday activities like shopping, carrying groceries, etc. get easier as well as your athletic movements. My favorite stabilization exercise, and my favorite ab building exercises, are the plank and side plank. To be honest, most people can build amazing 6 pack abs with these 2 exercises alone (provided their body-fat is low enough).
Lower Back Exercises
They work the abs isometrically–that is, they teach the abs to contract without them being moved a la crunches and sit-ups but to be flexed when the spine is straight. This way your abs can look flexed even when you are standing normally on the beach, for instance. If stability is the ability of the core to resist an unwanted movement, then strength is the amount of force the core can produce to perform the desired movement. After building stability, the next step would be to add movement to the core muscles to get them to work together. The movement part which works alongside stability is what helps to develop core strength. Exercises that build core strength include crunches, side crunches and reverse crunches. Now I know people may want to build strength in the abdominal but I believe that we should do so in the safest manner possible.
Cobra Exercise And Swiss Ball
Crunches, as popular as they are, in my opinion, are rather dangerous if performed incorrectly as most people do. The emphasis on having a straight back is usually forgotten and the movement gets sloppy which makes the whole core more vulnerable—the one thing we’re trying to avoid. Safer alternatives to crunches are the prone cobra exercise and swiss ball hamstring curl because there is more of an isometric hold of the core which is the safest way to work the abs. The final stage of core development for athleticism involves adding power. As you may know the power in simple terms is “speed x strength”. Therefore, we need to add resistance to the movement and execute it at high speed. Having core power is important for athletes of all levels especially explosive athletes like shot putters etc. but also more aerobic involved activities such as basketball players and soccer players.
Stabilization Exercises
(This movement is also very applicable to sports of all kinds especially throwing sports but can also help develop movement patterns and core power for other sports. Here we see Steve Nash performing the movement in his offseason workouts.) This is the way athletes develop core proficiency. The steps above can be very beneficial if we are looking to improve movement patterns for sport. To be honest, I mainly stick with stabilization exercises and I can maintain a six-pack year-round. For aesthetic value, they are very good to build a pleasing midsection. In my opinion, crunches, for example, can make the abs look pretty bulky(in my experience, anyway) therefore I stick with isometric exercises that help build muscle density and proportion.
Comments